


You’ll Be Just Fine

by Vanilla_Ella



Category: Bandom, Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Angst, Christmas time depression, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gen, M/M, Self-Esteem Issues, Tyler is Tyler enough said, jenna’s an angel, jordan’s sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 07:08:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17137277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vanilla_Ella/pseuds/Vanilla_Ella
Summary: Unwanted, unoriginal, unloved.These are familiar concepts to Josh.





	You’ll Be Just Fine

The thought first strikes as he watches Tyler from the floor, legs folded like a pretzel and hands in his lap.

There are stars in Tyler’s eyes, liquid ones that threaten to melt down his cheeks, the stage lights hitting those pools of endless chocolate like little dancing suns. 

His hands tremble as they strum the delicate strings of his ukulele, his voice wavering and cracking. He sounds on the verge of tears as he sings, as he talks, as he laughs. It would be alarming if it wasn’t so familiar to Josh’s ears. 

Tyler’s lips form words, his words form feelings, his feelings form haunting melodies that stretch across late bedtime calls and early morning rehearsals. 

Tyler’s an absolute angel, the halo around his head intense and blinding, and Josh feels caught up in it, trapped like a circus animal in the ring. 

And watching him from the floor, staring up at him in awe, he feels the familiar flooding into his heart, the quiet but ever present nagging. He’s felt it before, little sproutlets of something he can’t quite put his finger on. It’s almost maddening, with its barely-there but painfully obvious presence. 

Above all the love and admiration and gentle tenderness Tyler sparks in him, there’s something underneath, gnawing at him, something rotten and misplaced. 

Josh pushes it down and prays for the strength to ignore it.

 

•••

 

In the safety of the darkness, with the thrum of the bus engine underneath him and the loud silence of the atmosphere around him, Josh lies in his bed, reading through tweets, boredom spurring him to continue scrolling tiredly late at night when he begins coming across them.

Tyler is beautiful.

Tyler’s perfection.

Tyler is an angel.

Josh reads through hundreds of them, all alike in praise yet so different, marveling silently at the seemingly endless supply of black against white, praising his best friend as a hero, a savior.

It’s only when he puts his phone under his pillow and rolls over that he realizes it’s his first time reading them without smiling. 

 

•••

 

He feels it as he watches Jenna, sitting on the bar stool across the large counter that separates them. 

Jenna’s hands are delicate, well-crafted like a painter’s, long-fingered and perfect in every sense. 

They push and knead the dough, the flour rising above them in smoky clouds and reminding him of the ash filling the sky and lungs of California. 

Jenna’s rambling off about something, tour or holiday plans, he doesn’t know, but it isn’t something Josh is registering or even remotely thinking about. 

He thinks about the way a strand of blonde hair falls into her blue eyes, like golden sand into the endless ocean. He thinks about her perfect, pearl-pink lips and the cute spread of late summer’s freckles fading across her cheeks. 

He thinks about angels crafting each and every one of her long eyelashes out of stardust, her skin from the milky skies of Pluto. 

She’s startlingly beautiful, in every sense of the word, but moreover, her appearance is merely a reflection of her soul, her personality somehow shining through and upstaging her breathtaking beauty; she’s funny and witty and friendly and a complete darling, and Josh wonders how anyone could ever be so lucky to have it all. 

In her one-sided conversation, she suddenly lets out a laugh, a small, amused one, perhaps having startled or entertained herself by accident; it’s easily one of the smoothest, most joyful things Josh has ever heard, and it makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand. 

A choking feeling encircles his neck, and he forces himself to breathe.

 

•••

 

11 p.m.

Josh is brushing his teeth, staring at his foggy reflection through the mirror.

Something tired floods into his bones, and suddenly, there are unexplainable tears in his eyes, the same ones that sneak up on him in the middle of soundcheck, or when he’s doing the dishes. 

It’s harder to swallow, to breathe through them, but against all odds, Josh somehow manages to find a way.

But he avoids mirrors after that, avoiding his reflection.

 

•••

 

It whispers in his ear as he’s speaking on the phone. 

Jordan is filling him in on some sort of hilarious thing that happened over the weekend that he can’t seem to stop laughing about, and if his little brother’s whole instagram wasn’t splashed across his phone, he could just hear the laugh lines in his voice, or see his brown eyes crinkling in their familiar happiness with only his mind to picture them. 

Jordan’s whole feed is artsy, to say the least. Black and white, deep, warm-toned saturation, and endless blue skies are a staple in his pictures, giant, skull-splitting smiles and nature frequenting the almost-Polaroid perfect pictures. 

It’s almost startling, the world around Jordan being so much different from his own. He doesn’t remember the sun rays being so abundant, the moon light shining and illuminating the earth so intensely in the night. 

He bites his lip, makes choked, acknowledging hums in the back of his throat as Jordan’s crackling voice on the other end asks if he’s receiving him. 

The pit in his stomach opens wider.

 

•••

 

Jenna’s the first person who asks him. 

Her hand’s on his knee, the delicate fingertips stroking over the skin where her husband’s name is inked; her ocean eyes stare at him, stormy with concern. 

“Josh? Did you hear me?”

In truth, Josh doesn’t catch much these days, his head in the clouds of wishful thinking and blind hope only allowing him to nod dumbly at every question thrown his way, not that there were many, anyway. 

“Are you alright?” Jenna repeats, worry clear as her skin. There’s not a blemish marking it, no imperfection impeding in her perfection, and it makes Josh feel sick.

“Yeah,” he says softly, and he doesn’t meet her eyes out of fear and reverence, keeping them glued to the intrusive rips in his jeans and the way Jenna’s hand keeps stroking him. 

 

•••

 

In the shower, Josh screams into his palms.

 

•••

 

The actions that follow Josh’s slow but blossoming epiphany are strange things; confused, sudden desires in things he had no previous interest in pop up like corn kernels, and suddenly he’s sitting at the piano, reading jelly roll recipes off in the kitchen at midnight, and taking pictures like an obsessed blogger; a quiet, unacknowledged part of him hopes that these things will make him better, make him different, change him. 

Tyler’s confused at first, when Josh asks him to teach him how to play a song on the piano. 

“Knowing it on the drums ain’t enough for you, Jishwa?” From the teasing tone to the way his tongue playfully sticks out a little between his perfectly crooked, endearing teeth, Josh should know he’s just joking, poking a little fun at him in his usual-Tyler manner, but something broken in him recoils, takes his teasing as mockery. 

Of course Josh can’t learn to play piano.

“I’m kidding,” he laughs it off with Tyler, smashing his hands against the keys to further prove the point, that the only music he’s capable of making are these warbled, intruding, ear-grating sounds. 

His heart sinks a little as Tyler laughs louder.

Of course he can’t play piano.

He moves on quickly to the next thing, figuring if he can’t be like Tyler, he might be able to pass as Jenna. 

(Deep down, he knows she’s too pretty, too funny, too amazing, and too perfectly high up out of his league, unattainable to someone like him, but he’ll try anything to be better than he is.)

So when the moment comes that they’re both alone in the kitchen again, Josh sitting on the bar stool and Jenna behind the counter making chocolate chip cookies, he works up the courage and asks Jenna if he can help. 

She looks surprised, flour smeared across her cheek and hands leaving white prints across her gingham-green apron, but she smiles widely.

“Of course, Josh, of course you can help!”

She reaches over and grabs his wrist, all but nearly dragging him over to where she’s standing with enthusiasm-sourced super strength, blinding white teeth and sparkling eyes.

She teaches him how to use the mixing machine, when to add the sugar and the eggs and when to add the milk. She helps him fold in the chocolate chips into the batter, so painfully patient and eager to teach him. 

Josh is a mess of smeared batter by the end of it, but he’s laughing, his soul soaring just the smallest bit as he pushes the tray into the oven. 

Jenna’s smiling too, pulling the apron over her head and folding it. 

“I’m gonna wash up in the bathroom, okay? Just keep an eye on the cookies.” She smiles and walks past him, the clear confidence she had in him apparent. 

An intense sense of pride fills the hole in Josh’s chest.

He’s overcome without Jenna in the kitchen, the excitement at having done something she did on a regular basis making his stomach churn with anxiety and wonder. 

He hopes it’s enough, he just hopes it’s enough.

He’s pacing and twisting the hem of his shirt in his hands, too lost in his own thoughts to hear the oven beep.

By the time Jenna comes back, Josh perks up, ready to rattle off his nerves to her with chopped up, rapid-fire speech, but he doesn’t get the chance; as soon as she gets to the kitchen, her ocean eyes widen, and she moves over to the oven before quickly opening the door and peering inside.

“Awww....”

The moment she pulls out the tray, Josh’s excitement and hype have long died down, the indication of disappointment in Jenna’s first word back into the kitchen having melted his happiness away.

The cookies are now little black circles, pieces of coal or over-baked batter, he can’t tell.

The falling down from his high is such a quick descent that he’s rendered rather speechless, quietly forced to stare at his mistake. 

“It’s okay,” Jenna smiles and pats his back when she throws the cookies away. She doesn’t seem upset at Josh’s inability to do one single task unsupervised, to watch the cookies like he was supposed to; instead, she seems nonchalant, resigned to the turn of events and calm in the face of disappointment. 

It only makes Josh feels worse.

“We can make more,” she comforts him, but when Tyler walks in from the basement, hair sticking up in all directions and a frown on his face, Josh knows he needs to go home. 

Tyler sniffs the bitter air and scrunches up his face. 

“Cookies burn down?”

 

•••

 

When Jordan finds out, Josh thinks it’s the end of the world. 

It started with Josh leaving his phone unlocked when he got up to use the bathroom, leaving the large nest of blankets and pillows they had made in front of his large TV.

He’s washing his hands when he hears a faint giggle in the next room, and at first, confusion and curiosity make him wonder and tilt his head. 

It’s only when he re-enters his room that he pauses in his tracks, the sight of his brother’s large smile as he goes scrolling through Josh’s phone, the movie and popcorn all but abandoned, making his stomach churn nervously in a weird way. 

“Jordan?” Josh walks over, frowning disapprovingly at the younger, who at least has the decency to look somewhat sheepish. 

“Sorry,” he offers half-heartedly, though he makes no move to put down the phone and the smile never leaves his face. 

“What’re you looking at?” Josh sits down and looks over his shoulder. 

“Your pics,” Jordan’s wide smile turns megawatt with amusement, and at first, Josh doesn’t see what’s so funny, what’s got Jordan snickering and grinning like he’s in on some sort of joke Josh isn’t. 

“..so?”

“Dude, you got so many!” he laughs, “You even got one with you baking. What’re you turning into, one of those instagram girls with the pumpkin lattes and the fake candids?” And it shouldn’t offend Josh as much as it does, the teasing tone thick in Jordan’s voice and his eyes. The lack of actual maliciousness and attempts at actual shaming Josh for his sudden interest in capturing everything on camera should tip him off just enough to know that Jordan’s only poking fun at him (heck, he’s even heard Jordan make fun of himself for the pictures he takes) but Josh would be lying if he didn’t admit the hot flash of embarrassment that rushes through him. 

Josh stares silently at Jordan, unable to form any sort of response. He feels a little betrayed; if anyone understood wanting to appear and be perfect, he thought Jordan would be the first to, as he was constantly trying to improve his photography and everything he enjoyed. 

He watches the amusement slowly drain out of Jordan’s eyes, the smile slipping off into a concerned frown. 

“Josh?”

The older Dun blinks, swallowing hard. He grabs the phone out of his younger brother’s hand, and he knows he should just switch it off, laugh off the whole ordeal with some sort of joke and forget about the whole thing, just like he did with Jenna and Tyler, but he finds he can’t, instead turning his attention towards the pictures he’s taken to try and find the amusement behind them, what makes them such a joke. 

There are pictures of food, of the mountains he hiked a few days before, of Los Angelos twinkling in the night. The variety and doubles and the sheer amount of difference between the hundreds of pictures is startling, overwhelming and confusing all at once. 

But Josh can see it, putting a million filters on them and uploading them on Instagram just to get a few likes and comments. It seems so strangely warped and wrong all of the sudden, the mountains and the city disappearing in the pictures and amounting to nothing more than validation, brag rights and the false, beautiful lie of perfection. 

Josh feels it drain from him, tightening up in his throat with reality. 

He’s crying before he realizes it, Jordan’s arms around him and apologies pouring from his mouth as he tries as best as he can to soothe his older brother, but Josh is devastated with it, feeling like he’s suddenly lost something he never even had. 

Josh will never be perfect. 

 

•••

 

He lies in bed, Jordan’s head on his chest and his hands caressing skin. It’s dark in the room, silent; it wouldn’t be dramatic to say it reflected Josh’s current state of mind. 

Jordan sighs, sniffling a little as his hand trails up under Josh’s shirt, quietly soothing both himself and Josh with the little indulgence in skin and body-warmth comfort. 

“Will you tell me what’s wrong?” his voice is tired, run down by the thousands of apologies and the little crying session they undoubtedly both had in the shower. 

He bites his lip.

“It’s nothing, ‘m just emotional today, I guess,” Josh lies, and he feels the guilt blossom so quickly in his system, wonders when it became so easy to fall back on deception, especially when it came to his younger brother, of all people.

“I love you, y’know?” Jordan says softly, breath soft against Josh’s neck. “You could post weight loss smoothies and all about sponsored vacations with brands and companies on Instagram or Twitter and be the most obnoxiously blessed person in the world and I’d still love you for you.”

It’s the last part he adds that makes Josh’s heart clench painfully, tears springing in his tired eyes. 

“Love you too, J,” he promises sincerely, pressing his lips against the dark curls on the younger’s head as he encourages him to sleep. 

When Jordan’s breath evens out, his words coming silent and his apologies finally over, Josh looks out at the moon from his bed and wonders what it’d be like to disappear. 

 

•••

 

It’s not long before Tyler corners him. 

“Hey, you with me?”

Josh blinks. 

Tyler looks at him expectantly. 

“Josh,” he says almost sternly, clearly a little irritated if the deep frown on his face is anything to go by. 

“I’m sorry,” Josh apologizes quickly, vision becoming blurry with unshed tears and throat shutting itself up. He doesn’t know what brings on the sudden wave of emotions, but it’s strong and overwhelming, the feeling of being in the wrong so familiar and reasonably understandable.

The basement suddenly feels smaller, the escape route millions of light years away from where Josh is. 

He can hear the laughter upstairs, the faint Christmas music coming in through the walls.

“Josh...” Tyler’s voice becomes softer, and Josh feels fingers grasping his chin gently, forcing him to meet the younger man’s eyes. 

Being confronted in the middle of his best friend’s personal studio whilst a Christmas party went on upstairs wasn’t exactly how Josh expected this to happen, though, in truth, he never thought anyone would notice anyway. It was always easier to imagine that no one would acknowledge what was going on, just like it would be easier for them to not acknowledge Josh and how much of a failure he was.

“Josh.” Tyler’s thumb strokes his skin. “Jordan talked to me a little bit ago, y’know.”

Josh swallows tightly, screwing up his eyes and mentally finding Jordan upstairs, wherever he was, and demanding to know how many times the younger man would fuck him over was just the first thing on Josh’s list. 

“You can’t hide from me forever,” Tyler says softly, and his eyes are like syrup when Josh meets them with his own, swirling with sweetness and concern. 

“Ty, it’s nothing,” he lies quickly, perhaps too quickly. 

Tyler sighs, hand dropping as he slowly crosses his arms. 

“Josh, don’t do that to me. You don’t have to hide how you’re feeling, I can tell you’re miserable.”

“What tipped you off?” Josh snaps without thinking, quickly backtracking when the younger man narrows his eyes. “I’m—I didn’t...”

He drops his gaze to the floor, and it’s not long before the familiar shame seeps in, Tyler’s justified concern making Josh’s response seem overaggressive and defensive. 

“I was just kidding, Tyler,” he mumbles quietly, and he can’t even bring himself to sound somewhat believable even in his own ears. 

A heavy sigh, one so familiar and strangely soothing in its own sort of way, escapes Tyler, the worry so palpable and loud without ever leaving his lips. 

“Josh.”

He looks up just before Tyler wraps his arms around him, dragging him closer with a bold grab into his shirt and a firm tug. 

It’s warm in his arms, still smelling like the only home Josh had known in the middle of nowhere, whether it was in the van in the desserts of Arizona or the shared bed inside the foreign walls of Korea. 

It’s comforting and ripping out his heart all at once, one of heaven’s own angels holding him so lovingly and intimately together it nearly shuts Josh’s lungs down. 

“Tyler....”

The younger man shushes him, hands slipping under the hem of Josh’s shirt and going up his back. He laughs softly under his breath when Josh jumps at the cold temperature of them. 

“Tell me, Josh,” he murmurs, waiting until the skin of his fingers become somewhat bearable and warm before dragging his hands up and down Josh’s back, feeling the familiar bones and ribs he’d come to love so much. 

Josh swallows tightly, racking his brain and trying to sift through the complicated feelings. 

“I don’t know,” he mumbles, giving up much too easily. But isn’t that what Josh does? 

“Yes, you do,” Tyler retorts gently. “I know you do, just tell me.”

“Ty—“

“Just say it, man. It’s just you and me, just say it.”

‘I’m useless,’ Josh feels tears in his eyes, wants to sob, feeling it in the back of his throat but not daring to cry or say any of this in front of Tyler louder than his thoughts project them. ‘I’m worthless, and there’s nothing I can do right.’

A hand strokes up his back, firm and grounding. 

‘I hate myself, I hate myself,’ Josh shakes his head, burying his face in Tyler’s shoulder as he tries not to burst into tears. 

“Josh,” Tyler sounds heartbroken. “Josh, why would you say that?”

Josh blinks, confused for a moment, but when he dares to meet Tyler’s eyes, he can already tell he’s spilled all of his thoughts vocally, if the horrified look on Tyler’s face is anything to go by. 

He sobs in incredulity and anger at himself, moans in the pain from saying it out loud and finally condemning himself.

“Please don’t hate me,” Josh sobs, because it’s his first thought; not being enough and admitting it was bad enough, but to be doing those things with the famous, crazily talented lead man Tyler was? 

“Hey, hey,” Tyler murmurs when Josh buries his face into his shoulder, still crying hopelessly and clutching onto the younger man like he’s his lifeline. “I love you, you know that. What—where did this come from, J?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know!” he gasps like he’s going to die, his anxiety pulling his lungs short and holding back his breath; Tyler shushes him, rubbing his back and letting him breathe shakily.

Five minutes of trembling and trying to catch his breath, Tyler pulls away. 

“C’mon,” he says, tugging on his hand.

It’s a little difficult to sneak past everyone unnoticed upstairs, and Tyler has to stop a few times to talk to the people who interrupt their little getaway, but Josh simply remains silent, hiding his face in Tyler’s shoulder and letting him do the talking. 

After what seems like an eternity of trying to escape the shining lights and the laughter and the familiar crackly pop of old fashioned Christmas tunes, they get to Tyler’s room. 

Tyler shuts the door and moves to turn on the light but Josh grasps his sleeve.

He doesn’t even have to ask for Tyler to know, and the light stays off. 

The little glow from the Christmas sugar cookie candle Jenna is so fond of is burning in the adjoined bathroom, casting a small, dim light into the room so it’s not completely pitch black. It’s all Tyler needs to get Josh out of his clothes, the restricting ones that feel like they’re cutting him off and choking him like a viper. 

“C’mon,” Tyler tugs on Josh’s hand, helps him lie down on the bed. He tucks him in lovingly, smoothing the hair from his brow with a few gentle strokes. 

“Josh, look at me.”

The drummer bites his lip, meeting those beautiful chocolate orbs shyly. Tyler’s so beautiful, even when he can barely see him in the lowlight, and it makes him feel small, hilariously pathetic. 

“Joshie... my sweet, sweet boy,” he runs his fingers through Josh’s curls, sighing.

“Ty...” 

‘I’m not enough. I’m pathetic. I’m not worth your time.’ 

The thoughts are like poisonous bubbles, demanding attention and acknowledgement. He chews the inside of his cheek to burst them. 

“I’m sorry,” he settles on, ever so quiet and soft. 

“It’s a good thing I like putting up with you,” Tyler retorts as light-heartedly as he can, smoothing his hands across the blankets covering Josh, though the latter can see the deep sadness in his eyes, as if his heart is tearing in two. 

Josh blinks away the tears, sniffling a little as the singer sighs and lies down beside him.

His heavy arm slings over his waist, pulling Josh closer. When his nose presses against his nape and he lets out his soft angel breath, Josh shivers. 

“I love watching after you, y’know?” And there’s the familiar voice crack, the one that makes Tyler sound like he’s on the verge of crying, though something tells Josh that might be the case this time. “Everyone talks about how much they love my thoughts and my dreams but.. what I love are yours,” his fingers caress down Josh’s cheek, and he trembles. There’re the tears again. 

“I love your heart,” he confesses quietly, hand slipping over his chest and pressing firmly there, as if Tyler’s trying to actually touch the muscle in his chest and make sure it’s still beating. “I love how much you want and you feel and you love.”

Josh shivers when Tyler rolls him over to meet his eyes, grasping his chin in calloused fingers and his attention in a laser-beam focused gaze.

“J,” his voice is scarily solemn, barely above a whisper and near inaudible over the slow, heavy bass thump of the Christmas music and the endless conversations being made out of the room. “I want you to know that I love you, and you’re not worthless or pathetic or anything you think of yourself, okay?”

Josh bites his lip, nearly sobbing at Tyler’s gentle, sincere confession, his inner self-deprecating thoughts being shot to hell by the look of pure truth and affection in his eyes. 

It still remains though, curled up ugly in a little ball of iron and sitting in the back of his mind with quiet whispers of what Josh isn’t and how much he doesn’t deserve, but for now, with an angel staring at him and caressing him so gently and sweetly, Josh feels the pain lessen. 

“You’re lovely, Joshie,” Tyler’s lips press against his, tender and lovingly with no reservations or hesitation. “You’re so, so lovely.”

“Ty,” Josh whispers against his mouth, and a little part of him hopes, blindly and stupidly, hopes that, maybe, one day, he’ll be able to believe it.

**Author's Note:**

> the world’s most uninspired, unoriginal, unwanted writer back at it again with the depresso-espresso train. 
> 
> happy holidays i guess


End file.
